To not understand how people can live like this?!

[RevoltingPeasant]

DH and I moved into our first owned home together three weeks ago. The people before us owned it for 24 years and I think they probably cleaned once during that time.

So far, I have found

• a kitchen drawer filled with a couple of years' worth of fingernail clippings
  
• a clump - an actual clump - of black mould hanging off the shower screen
  
• a half eaten butcher's bone from their dog (I hope)
  
• dust in the cupboards that was actually caked on
  

Generally, whole place filthy and covered with dust bunnies. And then today, fleas :( now have to have whole house treated.

DH says i am 'fastidious' but AIBU to really not get how people can live year after year breathing in dust and mould and being bitten by fleas??

BLEURGH. That's all.

[Tiggles]

we live in a rented house.
On our inventory was a used sanitary towel stored in the airing cupboard .

[Buzzardbird]

We found a secret room in our new home and in it we found a record player and albums of show tunes and Judy garland.

[morganster]

that has made me spit my tea out!! i must check our loft.

[StickyFloor]

"a bag full of nipples, a bag full of vaginas, a bag full of cocks shock All carefully torn out and filed away"

ha ha ha ha ha my favourite quote ever!

[ExasperatedSigh]

Years ago, I rented a room in a house share. My housemates told me that when they'd first moved in, the place was totally dire - rotting carpets, dried shit smears on the walls and floors, just grim all round. They had to clean and redecorate everything themselves as the landlord was a complete wanker.

One of my housemates went up to clear the attic and found several binbags. Inside, she found masses of ripped up porn mags...sorted into body parts. So, a bag full of nipples, a bag full of vaginas, a bag full of cocks All carefully torn out and filed away.

[EMUZ]

We moved once and parents are in a job where you never see the accommodation before you move in. Mum cried when she saw it. Friend offered to help but friend is like Keeping Up Appearances (Mrs Bouquet)
She came armed with cleaning stuff. The blinds we thought were black were pale green. The bath stunk so we took the panel off to discover they had put all their used nappies and tampons down there

The worst was a place we lived and turned into a lovely home. Moved out and ended up moving back maybe 4 years later and they had absolutely destroyed it
Holes punched in every door, random holes smashed in the walls. That was my childhood home and they ruined it

[Jan49]

I'm read this thread fearfully in case the people who bought our old house last year have posted. I left it as clean as possible but it was empty for several months before the sale went ahead. They probably wonder why I lived there for 10 years and didn't decorate or replace carpets in that time. Answer to the first part: I was too busy, Answer to the second part, the carpets seemed ok when we bought the house and then I was too busy. I'm also embarrassed about the amount of limescale in the upstairs loo and the condition of the sealant around the bath. And a few other things. But I didn't leave any belongings or rubbish. (grovel emoticon).

[putyoursocksON]

When we moved in the teenage boy had Pantera posters up, he'd graffiti'd his wall, put locks on it which his dad or someone had bust and everything was filthy. It was going to be my 5 year old son's room. One of my friends said, 'ah just leave like that, not long til it'll be like it again!'

We also got loan phonecalls every day for the next year...

[LondonMan]

Maybe we need the system they have in Switzerland, where apparently a government inspector has to certify that property has been cleaned to an official standard before hand-over can go ahead. In the newspaper column where a British woman recounted her experience of this, one of her inspection failures was because she had not disassembled the kitchen tap and removed lime scale from the inside...

[teacherandguideleader]

Have never moved into anywhere grim but I remember living with an ex and moving the sofa to clean and finding all his toe nail clippings under there. His reason was he thought the dust mites would eat them.

We had lived together first in my flat and was clean, but as soon as we moved into our house he stopped following my cleaning 'rules' saying it was his house too. He wouldn't clean the toilet when he was ill (through drink).

We also came home from holiday to discover something had died under the floorboards (I'm sure it was something he had dropped that was at the bottom of it). I had been complaining for a week or so before we went away about the stench (it was vile) but he couldn't smell it and said I was being weird. We came home to a fly infestation. After a long night flight I stayed up to get it all sorted while he went to bed as he wasn't bothered by it.

It didn't take long for me to see the light and we split, but had to continue living together until the house was sorted. I stopped washing up for him and I remember one night him dishing his dinner up on a plate with the previous night's dried baked bean juice on it.

[poppy1973]

If you do have any carpets that you want to keep then put down lots of bicarb of soda and leave for a few hours and then hoover up. It takes the smell of dog away quite well.

[poppy1973]

Hi we had this when we moved into our house. Go and get some flea bombs, you can get these in large pet shops (Pets at home). Put one in a room, close the windows and doors and then light it. It should help. If there are any carpets you can always take up.

[MissBetseyTrotwood]

So my DH thinks I'm a bit bonkers for saying this but I really, really felt our house wanted us when we moved in. I just got a really warm feeling for it and could see through all the crumbling wood chip wallpaper and filth.

It's a tall thin Victorian house, fundamentally fine but needing loads of TLC inside. Everything we've done to it has felt like a healing loving process. It's been a real pleasure, though grim at first, to watch it come to life with a bit of care.

There's an awful place in our terrace that's recently been bought by a family and is being gutted and re done totally. I get a real 'ahhh' feeling of satisfaction when I see all the work being done.

[bluewonderful]

When we moved in we discovered the house hadn't been cleaned in the months since our offer was accepted.

Realised that the previous owners' cats had used a corner of the bedroom as a litter tray. Had the carpet up within half an hour and discovered another rotten, mouldy carpet underneath - they'd just laid the new carpet on top of the rank one (then let the new one get rank).

My lovely friend spent 5 hours cleaning the top of the cooker which had an inch of fat and grease mixed with cat hair baked on.

In the living room we thought they had sealed the gaps between the open floor boards. No, it was a home made mix of fag ends, cat hair, nail clippings and cat poo that had to be scraped out. Hoovering up the debris killed our Dyson.

They also left the garage and loft filled with crap they couldn't be bothered taking/getting rid of. Filthy filthy people.

[wonkylegs]

Yesterday we went to see the house again that we are in the process of buying and the owner apologised as she only had the curtains she's leaving us cleaned last year and she thought they might be a bit filthy.
I've been through my fair share of rubbish house moves though.
When I moved into my first house we had to rip out the grease stained snot coloured kitchen and found lots of dirty knickers behind cupboards and the cooker and a matching bra to one set on top of the cupboards, all caked in grease from the deep fat fryer.
The last move I made with my parents was on the surface fine but they ripped out every light fitting, curtain pole, hook, some plug sockets, toilet roll holder etc meaning we were stuck in the dark with only torches the first night we moved in.
They had however left us one thing.... The house had major subsidence which they quite purposely covered up. The new ugly fitted wardrobes and hall panelling were not just ugly interior decor choices but purposely installed to cover up a floor to ceiling crack big enough to put you hand inside.
The house had no foundations and cost serious money to put right.

[Badvoc]

When we moved into our first house the carpets were disgusting.
There was dirt/dust an inch thick behind the radiators.
They had just covered inches of grease in the oven with foil.
It was also broken.
The bath panel was broken and some of the spindles on the stairs were broken too.
The window seals were mouldy.
The bathroom was disgusting. We had to take up the bathroom flooring and the floorboards were rotten due to being weed on.
Yuck.

[LtEveDallas]

Not a dirt story, but I once moved into a house where we found a home made Porn (full on) starring the previous occupants

(Then) DH kindly returned it to them

[1Veryhungrycaterpillar]

Why would someone keep fingernail clippings??

[MummyPig24]

When we moved in here the previous owners left various items of furniture and also left food in the fridge! It made me boak, not because it was particularly dirty but it was just a bit gross to leave some old tomatoes and stuff behind.

I have only been in 2 really minging houses. A very good friend of mine as a teen had a disgusting house. God knows why I kept going over there (probably cos her mum didn't care what we did and let us smoke in the bedroom).

A few days before Christmas I picked up some guinea pigs for the children and oh my goodness the house was horrific. I just felt ill and dh said I stank when I came out!

I'm not really a clean freak but I clean regularly and I can't understand why people live like that. Maybe they don't notice or are too depressed to deal with it.

[FanjoPaterson]

Bloody hell. And I thought my lime green and electric violet walls were bad
Although, six months in we're discovering just how dodgy the extension is. Roof leaks chronically, windows are rotted through, the whole thing is shifting on its foundations, it will cost thousands to fix.
When we moved in, though, it just needed a good scrub and some attention.

[somanymiles]

Once I was cleaning out a flat we owned that had tenants living in it and found a frozen puppy foetus in the freezer. That was definitely the worst, but also amazed at the filth some people will put up with. Our last tenant left a microwave caked on the inside a cm thick with food splashes. I cringed to think of the meals she prepared for her 4 year old in it.

[Angloamerican]

bedmonster how awful. I'd have cried too.

[Picoo]

Haven't been able to get past the drawer full of finger nail cuttings

[IloveJudgeJudy]

When we moved into our house, the previous occupant hadn't cleaned at all. The carpets were advertised as "fitted". When she took the furniture out, it was obvious that the carpets were like a jigsaw. The whole place was filthy. The wiring was dangerous. She had left loads of junk in her garage.

When we visited to view, she seemed lovely, clean, friendly. You just can't tell.

[Startail]

I've plenty of dust, loads of cobwrbs and the odd bit of mould, they all seem quite happy living here, it seems a shame to disturb them.